[1][2] Victoria Miller, writing for the digital marketing platform AXS, considered her music with The Brady Bunch bubblegum pop; she cited the 1973 song "It's a Sunshine Day" as an example.

[10] McCormick described the album as "[her] debut singing"; when asked about her past music career, she said, "Well, those weren't solo songs.

"[13] While completing When You Get a Little Lonely, McCormick was offered a cameo role on The Brady Bunch Movie (1995) but turned it down to focus on the album.

[1] She had also been approached the previous year about the same cameo but was unable to accept because she was playing Betty Rizzo in a Broadway production of the musical Grease.

[1][14] McCormick described When You Get a Little Lonely as "country crossover" and said, "We tried to get some different styles, one that's upbeat, then there's a bluesy, jazzy, sexy song, then a commercial feeling".

[15] The instruments used on When You Get a Little Lonely include pedal steel guitar, fiddle, and piano, which a People magazine contributor called "all the twanging tools of the [country music] trade", and wrote that McCormick adopted a "Nashville accent".

[9] Mike Hughes, writing for The Times Herald, described McCormick's cover of Nicolette Larson's 1985 single "When You Get a Little Lonely" as "an up-tempo, dance-hall tune in current country style".

[1] Lisa Gutierrez, writing for Democrat and Chronicle, described When You Get a Little Lonely as a "truly grown-up work" in comparison to her performance as Marcia Brady.

[7] During a 1995 interview, she said people, particularly DJs, enjoyed the album and her voice; Orlando Sentinel's Gary McKechnie wrote that it "seem[ed] to be popular with country music fans".

[13] She held album signings in 1995 at a Hollywood Virgin Megastore, the Orlando record store Peaches Music & Video, and a Henrietta Media Play.

[14] McCormick promoted the album by performing at Lake Compounce, an amusement park in Bristol and Southington, Connecticut, on July 2, 1995.

On his official website, Barry Williams, who played Greg Brady, held a competition in which viewers could win prizes, one of which was a copy of When You Get a Little Lonely, for guessing the winner of The Weakest Link correctly.

[9] Despite praising the song selection, Hartford Courant's Anita M. Seline criticized McCormick's voice, specifically on her "tepid" version of "Oh Boy!".

[18] A People writer suggested McCormick record pop music or covers of 1970s Top 40 songs because "kitschy stuff, after all, has a remarkable shelf life".

"[16] Kathleen Adams and Lina Lofaro, writing for Time criticized McCormick's voice and said she "shows scant vocal or emotional range and her backup musicians follow suit".

Alanna Nash panned When You Get a Little Lonely as "the most manufactured of country pop" and criticized McCormick for singing with "the overwrought exuberance of a high school variety show contestant".

[15] The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Miriam Longino wrote that she "can carry a tune" and that the album has the "slickest arrangements and studio musicians", but she largely dismissed it as "a contrived attempt to cash in on country's popularity".

Longino said McCormick's interpretation of country music was inauthentic, writing, "A pair of Tony Lama boots cannot transform this California actress into Patsy Cline".

[20] In a 2010 Newsday article, Daniel Bubbeo wrote, "it's doubtful [McCormick] caused Reba McEntire to have any sleepless nights".

"[37] Also in 1997, McCormick was an opening act for Clint Black and Faith Hill, and performed with Hal Ketchum and the Confederate Railroad.

[2] The following year, she competed on the first season of the reality television show Gone Country;[2] as the prize, John Rich would produce the winner's song, and it would be sent to radio.

[39] Access Hollywood's executive producer Rob Silverstein hired McCormick as a red-carpet reporter for the 2008 CMT Music Awards after seeing her on Gone Country.